


For What We Are About to Receive

by Sally M (sallymn)



Category: Blake's 7
Genre: Gen, Humor, Series 3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-18
Updated: 2009-11-18
Packaged: 2017-10-03 08:34:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sallymn/pseuds/Sally%20M
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In space, no one can make you eat...</p><p> </p>
            </blockquote>





	For What We Are About to Receive

**For What We Are About to Receive**

****

"Just what did you put in this, Vila?"

****

"I didn't," he said with the outraged innocence of someone caught with their hand in the till.

****

Tarrant silently pointed a fork at the bowl of lumpy, unnervingly pink stew in front of him, then at Vila's plate with its plain waxweed sandwiches.

****

"I didn't - well, yes I did. But I didn't want to."

****

"What did you put in it?"

****

"It was -" he looked around to see who wasn't here, "- Cally's idea, really!"

****

"But what _is _it?"

****

Dayna, who was happily chewing her way through an especially chewy piece of something. "It's good, Tarrant. Just eat it."

****

Tarrant frowned at her, then looked away quickly as she speared another piece of the something, and stared down at his own. "It's got thorns, Vila."

****

"Spines, probably," the cook mumbled.

****

"What was that?"

****

"I said s'fine. Cally thinks humans need to eat more meat."

****

"Any meal without meat is a waste of digestive juices," Avon drawled, wandering in in search of coffee. "You've all heard her say so."

****

"We have," Dayna agreed cheerfully, tearing off one of the thorny spines. Tarrant suppressed a shudder, grateful once again that Avon had forbidden Sarran recipes to be uploaded into Zen.

****

"Repeatedly," Vila stared down at his dully virtuous plateful, and wondered if he could sneak a soma to make it less virtuous.

****

"And in far more detail than anyone needs to hear," Tarrant grumbled. "So just what _did_ you put in this, Vila?"

****

"What do you think?" Vila edged his chair away as he spoke. "Cally doesn't believe in wasting fresh meat, and the only fresh meat we've seen for weeks..."

****

"Is -?" Dayna looked up. "We haven't been anywhere but - Kairos..."

****

Her eyes narrowed.

****

Tarrant's eyes widened, and he dropped his knife into the stew, which splashed sludgily at him.

****

Avon's eyes gleamed with what, in someone else, might have been laughter.

****

"It's very good for you, Tarrant," Cally spoke coolly from behind them, "spider stew is very healthy, very lean and almost fat-free. You don't eat enough protein. I've noticed, and I'm getting tired of nursing people who don't look after themselves."

****

"But - but Cally -"

****

"Just eat it." She took up her own bowl and turned to go back to the flight deck, and fixed a glare on Vila. "You too, and you," at her not so fearless leader, whose eyes didn't look like laughing any more. "Finish it, and we'll have spider soup tomorrow."

****

There was a silence as she left.

****

"Avon," Vila said slowly, looking at the stew as if he thought it would climb out and eat _him_, "you remember that place that grew tropical fruits before the war."

****

"Just tropical fruit and nothing else," Tarrant nodded. "Or almost nothing else."

****

"Palmero. Yes, I remember..."

****

"Just a thought, you know but - if we're foraging for food instead of fighting the Federation now - d'you want to find a reason to go _there_ next?"

****

 

****

Though when they finally gave in, gave up, and ate it with kumquats from Palmero - and a _lot_ of Soma to wash it down - they found out that Dayna was right.

****

Spider stew _was_ very, very chewy - and very good.

**

  
**\- the end -**   


**


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